


there ain't no glory in the west

by foxwatson



Category: Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007)
Genre: Assisted Suicide, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, First Kiss, Frottage, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Suicidal Thoughts, also hey what you may actually be here for, and kind of implied, at least passive suicidal thoughts, because it's not JUST a fic about death i promise, but if you watched the movie basically the themes are the same, jesse's contemplation of his own end in this is no joke, more of jesse than of robert, on that note, really though he dies offscreen still in this fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-24
Updated: 2020-06-24
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:14:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24892213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxwatson/pseuds/foxwatson
Summary: Robert Ford is a curious man. Jesse doesn’t quite know what to make of him.
Relationships: Robert Ford/Jesse James
Comments: 7
Kudos: 17





	there ain't no glory in the west

**Author's Note:**

> title credit to orville peck's no glory in the west, which has a kind of feeling to it which reminds me so much of this movie. if i made fanvids, maybe i'd make one just to put the two together - but i don't, so. i named the fic after it instead
> 
> if you've skipped out on reading the tags, please don't, but also: heads up that this fic deals with jesse's sort of passive suicidal thoughts/the movie's implication that in some sense jesse was ready and maybe even willing to die and. specifically i lean into it pretty heavily here in a way that almost implies assisted suicide so. be careful with all of that.
> 
> a less important heads up is that this fic does assume you've seen the movie, and pretty recently - it might make sense if you haven't, but i do kind of skim over the onscreen events of the film.

Robert Ford is a curious man. Jesse doesn’t quite know what to make of him.

He keeps him close at first, because it seems like the right thing to do. Try and get a better read. Try and understand what really goes on in his head. Jesse’s been good at reading people for a long time - good at knowing too much. It’s what made him a good outlaw, a good gunfighter, a good leader. He doesn’t ever keep his enemies close anymore either - that’d be too close. If he doesn’t trust someone, he gets rid of them, however he knows how.

It’s not that he doesn’t trust Bob. He just can’t understand him - and that’s it’s own kind of mystery. There’s not a lot of people Jesse’s ever met that he doesn’t understand. That he can’t unravel with a simple flick of his hand.

On the one hand, Bob’s a terrible liar. Sweats under pressure. Cracks if Jesse pushes at all. But on the other hand - Jesse just can’t understand all his motives. Fame, maybe, sure. Some kind of - fascination? Obsession? Which is flattering, in a certain way, and leaves Jesse hollow in another.

For years now, Jesse’s tried to measure up to the image of himself in the papers and the books. He threatens, he fights, he steals, he walks and talks the right way - but he can’t seem to be Jesse James either. The jobs fall short, the men run off, and when he fights he goes too far or he doesn’t go far enough. People think he’s insane or they think he’s a pansy.

He just can’t live up to himself.

In a way, Bob is a living manifestation of all of that. The light in his eyes slowly dims, over the time he stays at Jesse’s house. The novelty fades.

If Jesse knew how, maybe he’d fight to maintain it - but he doesn’t. He can’t.

Instead, he sends Bob Ford back home with nearly nothing to show for it except a story - and not even a very good one.

But somehow, it’s like he lingers in the house. Like a shadow just in the corner of Jesse’s vision, every time he turns a corner. He expects Bob to still be there, to have turned around and showed back up. To follow him into town, to haunt him like a living ghost. But Jesse told him to go, and he left.

At the first sign of trouble, Jesse takes Zee and the kids and they move as far away as he can get them. As far away from that house as he can. With the image of Bob in every room still burned on the insides of his eyelids, he can’t stand the place anymore.

And, as it turns out, it was a good idea to get the hell out of town anyways. But that’s where the real trouble all starts. Because that’s where the gang all falls apart and starts to eat itself alive, and Jesse - Jesse has to make some decisions about who he trusts and who he doesn’t.

He doesn’t see Bob again until after Wood’s killed. And Jesse knows he was killed. He knows Wood quarrelled with Dick and probably went after him like a fool.

It’s not actually that Jesse had any real fondness for Wood, even as much as Wood liked to go waving their common blood around. It’s that on principle, a famous gunfighter can hardly know who murdered his family and let him live.

Only when he shows up to the Ford house, he realizes - they do know who killed Wood. And not because it was Dick. Something else happened. Something happened to Charley’s leg - and something has happened to Bob. Nervous, unassuming Bob, gentle and defensive and eager - has hardened. He’s grown up - if only a little.

Jesse has a feeling he knows what happened - but if he gets Bob alone, and he cracks, Jesse will have no choice but to kill him.

He suddenly realizes that he doesn’t want to.

He could. It’s not so hard to pull a trigger. But he’s tired of the killing - and even if he wasn’t, he has no desire to see Bob Ford dead. He couldn’t say why.

Instead, though, he does something worse. He forces himself to be cruel to Robert Ford. He backs himself into a corner, so he’ll have to take Charley. If Charley cracks, he’ll likely take the blame over his brother - and then Jesse won’t have to kill Bob. He’ll just kill his brother - and though Jesse’s known Charley for longer, it doesn’t feel like he has.

Maybe it’s just because with Charley, it feels like there’s nothing to know.

Jesse stays the night at the Ford house.

He takes a bed in the big shared room. When he goes up, quietly, Bob is hunched over a shoebox on his bed.

“What’s that?” Jesse asks.

“None of your goddamn business,” Bob snaps back.

“Listen, Robert…” He trails off, goes and sits down on the edge of Bob’s bed, in front of him.

“Get off.”

“Not until you listen to me.”

Finally, Bob looks up, though he keeps his hands pressed tightly over the lid of the shoebox. Jesse can only guess what’s inside. Keepsakes. Things from his childhood. Maybe just a gun - because maybe he had a mind to come back down and start a fight after everything that’d been said. If Robert really did kill Wood - Jesse has a feeling either way, Bob could kill a man.

“I’m only gonna say this once all the way through. Once I’m finished, your brother’ll probably come upstairs, we’ll all go to bed, and in the morning I’ll head out with him before you ever get up. But before I go, you’re gonna hear what I have to say. I know my cousin came here to face off with Dick Liddel. I don’t have any more love for him than anybody else - I don’t really give a shit who killed him. Not really. The trouble is - I can’t know who killed my cousin and let them get away with it. Things like that spread, Bob. Rumors like that can kill a man stone dead. Especially a man like Jesse James - a man that’s more legend than blood. You probably understand that better than anybody. So I know you and your brother are lying to me. I don’t think Dick went to see his wife. I sure as hell know your brother wasn’t up on the roof with no goddamn cat. But the thing is - if you don’t tell me, and we all make sure nobody knows, the only punishment you ever get is what happened downstairs. Contrary to what you may think, I don’t enjoy being cruel. And I don’t like what I just did one bit. But some things have to be done. I think you can understand that, too. Can’t you, Robert?”

Slowly, Bob swallows. Then, he nods.

“See, your brother isn’t as smart as you are, Bob. So I’m gonna have to teach him this lesson the hard way. Your brother has more air between his ears than brain - so teaching him can’t just be telling him. It takes a little more work. But you should know - I made fun of you downstairs, but I don’t intend to keep it up. I got you all worked up to prove a point. And now that my point’s been proven - as long as you and your brother keep your mouths shut, we can bury this whole thing. Maybe not with Dick - I don’t trust Dick Liddel any further than I could shoot him, and if he happens to be where he could hear me right now, I don’t mind him hearing it straight from me. But you and your brother - I have no quarrel with, Bob. Not anymore. So we can all go to bed, and if I come back this way, as far as I’m concerned, you and I can be friends again.”

A strange kind of spasm passes over Robert’s face. “Friends?”

“Friends, Bob. At the very least.” With that, Jesse reaches up, and places his hand on Bob’s shoulder. He squeezes once, gently, and then he turns his back to go to his bed.

If there really was a gun in that box, it’d give Bob the perfect opportunity to shoot him.

“Jesse, wait,” Bob calls out.

In response, Jesse turns.

“My - well. All that stuff Charley said downstairs about me, as a kid - that was true. I guess you figured that much, and I - I have all this-” Carefully, Robert takes the lid off the shoebox with shaking hands. “These are all the magazines. The - stories and - a souvenir from the Blue Cut job. I keep it all in here.”

Over by his cot, still, Jesse takes off his gun belt and shrugs out of his jacket, then walks back over to Robert’s bed. Sure enough, inside, there’s a collection of stories and artifacts that tell the made up stories of Jesse’s entire life. “Well I’ll be damned,” Jesse says quietly.

It’s not that he didn’t think it was all true. All the trivia, the newspaper clippings - but to have Robert try, again, to share it with him - like there’s something he’s trying desperately to get Jesse to understand.

This time, Jesse lets him try. He reaches inside the box, hesitating to check Bob’s expression, only to be answered with a nod. Then he picks up one of the books and opens it carefully. It’s the story of his first robbery, his early life and escapades. Stories about him from when he was younger than Bob is now. There’s illustrations, sketches and graphic descriptions of the gunfights.

“Bob, can I ask you something?”

“Of course.” They’re both speaking quietly, now. Trading secrets in a house with thin walls.

“You know - I’m not the only gunfighter. You could say the most famous but just - why me?”

“It’s - like I said downstairs. It’s like we’re - connected. Like destiny.”

“Destiny,” Jesse echoes. It’s an idea that Jesse has become more friendly with over time. Lately, he’ll rely on anything that might be able to help him, to be honest with him, and that includes desperate searching attempts to better understand his own future. When he was younger, though, Jesse would have spat on the very concept of destiny. Would have said any limitation, any barrier could fuck right off and go to hell. “I spent a lot of time not believing in things like that. Even now I’m not so sure.”

“Maybe I could - convince you.” Just like always, Bob speaks haltingly. Like he’s trying it out. Waiting to see how Jesse reacts.

Jess just looks at him, at his big eyes and his clenched jaw, and his messy, too long hair. There’s something about him, still. Something Jesse can’t place or name or process. “You know, Robert - you just might.”

Any path the conversation might have taken from there is interrupted by Charley’s footsteps on the stairs.

From there, the plan proceeds as spoken. In the morning, his breath clouding in the cold air, Jesse rides out from the Ford House before the sun crests over the horizon. He looks back at the house - and he swears he could feel Bob’s eyes on him somehow, watching him from the window.

The trip with Charley is long and tiresome. Jesse doesn’t feel like he gets much done, and Charley is dumber than rocks, which is suddenly intolerable in the face of knowing he could have just brought Robert instead.

But Jesse brought Charley out to make a point - and once that point is made, everyone gets to go home.

Well. In a way.

The thing is, out in the middle of nowhere with Charley, Jesse can’t avoid the thought that with Ed and Cummins and Dick Liddel turning left and right, things seem to be drawing to their natural end. He doesn’t like the idea of leaving his children behind, fatherless - nor though, does he like the idea of being publicly hanged when that doesn’t keep a roof over his family’s heads either.

His time is running out. The end of the road is surely rising up to meet him. He’s growing tired of fighting something that approaches so steadily, unflinching, and that leaves him with only one choice - how he goes.

With the rest of the gang long since gone, the only potential for one last job lies with the Ford brothers. If Jesse takes them both and works something out, there may be one last robbery to pull before it all comes crashing down.

So the Ford brothers move in with him. Only once do they sneak off together, and Jesse takes them to task for it - otherwise, slowly, they relax into a kind of rhythm, planning for a job that Jesse becomes less and less certain will actually happen.

He is plodding towards something inevitable - something like destiny. He just doesn’t know exactly what shape it’s going to take.

One night he lures Robert close to him, surprised by how easy it still is - but Charley walks in and Jesse is forced to turn it into another cruel joke. Guilt snakes tightly between his ribs even as he does it, even as Robert falls into uncomfortable laughter, forced to join in.

There is one more thing, it turns out, he would like to do before he goes, and it is not one last robbery.

That night is the first of several that he tells Charley to sleep in the main room to keep watch over the house - and he has Robert share his bedroom, instead. It’s reminiscent of the setting of their first hushed, genuine conversation in the Ford house, where Jesse finally decided to listen.

Still, Bob doesn’t seem to understand the charm. He is quiet and nervous - and likely enough, still angry.

“Do you remember what you told me about destiny?” Jesse asks the dark, quiet room. The moonlight bleeds in through the curtains - just enough that he can turn his head and make out Robert’s silhouette.

He’s quiet for long enough that Jesse starts to wonder if he’s going to pretend to have fallen asleep. Their breaths rasp in the night air, almost in sync. “Yeah. I remember.”

“I think maybe I’ve come to believe you. Not that your brother has anything to do with it - but I think you were right about yourself.”

“Is that why you asked me here?”

“Is it why you agreed to come?”

Robert huffs out a sound that is not quite a laugh or a scoff. “Maybe. Not exactly.”

“Did you think I’d kill you if you didn’t come?”

“You still might,” Bob says. It’s the kind of thing he wouldn’t let slip in the light of day, or if he could see Jesse’s eyes. Here in the dark, the words still linger in the space between their beds.

“I don’t believe I will, Bob. But I wish I could say I felt you’d extend me the same courtesy.”

“Jesse-”

“Don’t lie to me. At least give me that. You’re a shit liar and you have been since the day we met.” Jesse sighs, and turns his head to look out the window. He can see the stars from this bed - trace the constellations with his eyes. “I won’t say this again. And surely not in front of your brother. But somebody’s gonna do it, soon. And if it’s you - it makes a better story, doesn’t it? You’re smart. You understand. Charley wouldn’t. I won’t hang at the hands of some law man, I deserve more dignity than that - and if someone has to do it. Maybe it oughta be you.”

“I don’t -” Bob hesitates. “I don’t know what to say to that.”

“You don’t have to say anything. We can pretend I never said it in the morning. Just give me the courtesy to at least realize I’m not stupid, Robert.”

“No - no, of course you’re not. You - how do you always know? Dick told me that a long time ago. Held a gun to my head and tried to tell me not to rat him out, but you knew anyways.”

“In a lot of ways, there are men smarter than me. But I could always see things other people couldn’t. You can’t just watch your back when you do work like this - you have to watch forward and back and each and every side. You have to have the sense to know even if you trust someone, maybe they don’t trust you. That doesn’t mean it comes easy to me - but I had a lot of time to learn it.”

Robert goes quiet again, after that.

Jesse feels, sometimes, that he talks too much in front of Bob. In spite of what he said about it being easy around Charley - something in Bob’s strange manner makes Jesse want to talk. Makes Jesse want to tell him things nobody else knows, just because Bob seems hungry for them in a way no one else ever has.

“Do you think it seems cold in here?” Bob asks, his words still whispered, echoing over the wooden floorboards.

“How are you colder further away from the window?”

“I don’t know.”

“I suppose if you’re angling to come over here, you’d better just do it.”

The boards creak softly under Bob’s feet - and then the mattress sags with added weight. Jesse shuffles forward, closer to the window, and still when Bob slips under the sheets with him, they’re close enough that Jesse can feel his warmth. Their arms brush, just barely, where they lay side by side.

Quiet falls over them again, just long enough that Jesse closes his eyes and settles into the silence.

Then Bob speaks. “I know what you mean. That someone’s got to do it. I just wish it wasn’t true.” 

A hand brushes along Jesse’s forearm - practically tracing the shape of it. The touch is so gentle it’s barely there - there’s no weight behind it, and Jesse could easily just turn over and pretend he didn’t feel it. 

Instead, he turns his arm palm up. Robert’s hand slows down, and his fingertips trace the lines of Jesse’s veins, pressure just firm enough to feel their way through the fabric of Jesse’s shirt.

“Maybe you can’t understand it, but in some ways it’s a relief,” Jesse admits. “When I told your brother I’m not sure he believed me but - I’m tired. A man can only run for so long. Maybe you’ll learn that someday. I hope you don’t have to, but I have a feeling you will.”

“I believe you. I just wish things were different.”

“Stories have to end sometime.”

Jesse has every intention of turning over, turning his back to Robert, and letting that be the end of it. He’s come to respect Robert - admire him in some small way, to appreciate him. He’s even glad, in some way, that somebody could fit so perfectly the role they’re meant to play. It really is like Bob was chosen somehow to be the one to put an end to him.

But things are never quite that simple.

“Jesse,” Bob says.

“Yeah?”

Suddenly, Bob shifts, moving quicker than Jesse really realized he could, getting one arm on Jesse’s other side and caging him in, hovering over him there in the dark.

His face is all lines and shadows, his hair falling into his face. Were it any other man, in any other situation, Jesse would have shoved him off or fought back just on pure instinct. After the conversation they’ve had, Jesse waits, just a moment, to see the intention behind it.

Bob just stays there, propped up on his arms, staring.

“You know, staring’s not a crime, but you probably could have done it just as easily from over there.”

“Everybody else always says they don’t like it when I stare. Got me into fights when I was a kid.”

“Now that I can believe,” Jesse tells him. Slowly, he takes one of his hands and places it on the back of Bob’s head, just at the nape of his neck, edging up into his hair. “You do a lot of staring.”

“Not at everybody.”

“No. That’s true.” Carefully, he threads his fingers through Robert’s hair and tries for a gentle touch.

Bob tilts forward, slipping out of Jesse’s grasp, and then their lips are pressed together in a kiss - brief, and dry. When he pulls back again, Bob’s eyes are all wild, anxious and terrified, like Jesse’s caught him in a lie again. “You sure you’re not gonna kill me?” he asks.

Jesse laughs at that, one sharp chuckle. “If I did, it wouldn’t be for that.”

With that, Bob falls forward again like someone’s cut all his strings. His mouth is pressed against Jesse’s, and this time Jesse has the chance to put his hand back on Bob’s neck, to steer the kiss into something more deliberate.

He’s got a nice mouth. Jesse had noticed that before, the last time he’d made remarks about kissing, or Bob breaking hearts - this is most of what he’d thought about. It’s a funny kind of kiss, though - nothing like the dry pecks he trades with his wife, or the way a working woman kisses. In this case, Bob kisses like he’s grateful - and Jesse really isn’t sure what he’s meant to do with that.

When they separate, Robert exhales, a little puff of air in the space between them. “Why’d you let me do that?”

“You say that like we didn’t both get something out of it.” He shifts his hips and opens his legs - Robert settles between them, and his eyes go big and dark.

“Shit. I didn’t-”

“You should know better by now than to make assumptions about me.”

“I guess so.” He sighs, tilts his head forward and presses it against Jesse’s neck. Then, he takes a long, slow breath in and lets it out again. “It’s just a few days til the job. Does any of this - matter?”

“I think that’s up to you. You’re the one that has to live with it.”

Bob lifts himself up again. He takes a long, thoughtful pause, while his eyes move over Jesse’s face. Then, when he falls forward into the next kiss - this one is fierce, and hungry. This time Robert bites Jesse’s lip so hard he might draw blood - but Jesse’s not certain either of them would mind if he did.

Neither of them put much effort into touch or finesse - Robert stays pressed close in the cradle of Jesse’s hips, and they shift against each other restlessly, practically shoving at each other as they drive relentlessly towards their end.

They finish up at almost exactly the same moment, and Bob relaxes again, his face back in its place pressed against Jesse’s neck, his breath warm against Jesse’s collar.

“I don’t know if I can. Live with it, I mean,” Robert mutters, still breathless.

“Little late for that now.”

Bob’s hands slide up under Jesse’s shoulders, and his fingers grasp desperately at the fabric of Jesse’s shirt, like he can pull himself closer - like if they just keep pushing and pulling they can be in the same space somehow, no longer separated. “I know. Guess that makes me a fool.”

“No. For better or worse, you’re no fool, Robert Ford.”

When Jesse says his full name, Bob shivers.

Jesse lets him pretend he’s still cold - he tugs the sheet up and over the both of them - and he doesn’t try to get Bob to move away from him, or lie down on his own again. “We should get some rest. You’ll still need it.”

“We’ve got a couple more days.”

“And there’s still work to be done in the meantime. But anyways - whatever happens is up to you.”

“I don’t think it is,” Robert says, his voice somehow quieter than a whisper. More like an exhale. “I wish it was.”

Jesse sighs, then. He closes his eyes, and lets his hand fall back to the back of Bob’s head, lets his fingers slide through his hair again. “Suppose you’re right. Maybe it’s not much up to either of us anymore.”

“Could you - do me one favor?”

“I think I’ve done you a few.”

It doesn’t make him laugh - but it’s a close thing. “I just mean - when it does happen. I know it makes me a coward - I’d rather not have to see your face.”

In a way, Robert is right. Usually it makes a man a coward to shoot another man in the back. That’s the way that people talk about it. But what if both men see if coming? What if a man offers up his own back, tells someone else to shoot him in it? What then? “Assuming I have that kind of clarity in the moment, I guess I can offer that much.”

Bob exhales again, slowly, and somehow curls closer, wrapping himself around Jesse. “Thank you.”

“Mm,” is all Jesse can really say in response.

Some part of him wants to say thank you - but maybe now’s not the time. Maybe the time won’t ever come, or maybe Bob won’t be close enough to hear it, when it happens.

Either way, they have a couple more days.

“Guess I should let you get your rest, too,” Bob says, as he finally shifts a little.

Jesse wraps one arm tight around Robert’s waist. “Just stay here. No use in you shivering over there, keeping me awake. Besides - I don’t really want you getting any ideas while I’m sleeping.”

“I wouldn’t do it while you’re sleeping.”

“You say that now. Just - indulge me.”

“Alright.”

They fall into silence, and Robert relaxes again, there in Jesse’s arms. Bob is the first one to fall asleep, too, and Jesse listens as his breaths slowly even out.

He thinks, to himself, that maybe tomorrow he’ll go into town and he’ll buy Bob a present. Maybe a new gun, to replace that old Grandaddy Colt of his.

It seems sort of poetic.

With that in his mind - Jesse falls asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> i have ajskdflms LITERALLY no idea if anyone will read this but. a) there's like almost no fic in this tag and i wanted some after i finished the movie and couldn't find any so if you were in that same boat now. here's this. b) i'm. doing a lot of like. experimental writing where i write for just. whatever strikes me in the moment so i'm at least writing and after i watched this movie this just kind of tumbled out!
> 
> if you read it, i hope you enjoyed it, and i'd love to hear what you liked, if anything! thank you for reading either way.


End file.
